Gendered Punishment – The Impacts of Incarceration on Mothers

This chapter shows how experiences of imprisonment are shaped by gendered and relational aspects of the mothering experience and how this acts as an additional dimension of punishment that is unrecognised by the legal system. Informed by in-depth interview research, the book explores the pain of separation from children as well as the experiences of witnessing harm to children from a position of being unable to enact mothering strategies to prevent it. The vulnerability of both mothers and children is considered, with particular attention to how witnessing harm to one’s children as a result of one’s own punishment is a profoundly harmful and disempowering experience. This is rendered more painful by the gendered social and cultural expectations that demand intensive mothering as a condition of moral character. I argue that separation as punishment constitutes a disenfranchisement from the practice of mothering which deskills mothers and generates both identity turmoil and profound social stigma. These impacts are shaped by the salience of mothering to women’s gendered social roles. This is not reflected in the experiences of men who go to prison who do not experience the same gendered stigma and whose children most commonly remain in maternal care. As such it is a gendered dimension of punishment that is not adequately recognised by the legal system.